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Could Jeremy Bamber Finally Be Exonerated?

Matthew Steeples
Could Jeremy Bamber Be Exonerated?

Matthew Steeples asks: “As highly respected forensic scientist Philip Boyce finds yet more serious flaws in the evidence that led to Jeremy Bamber’s conviction, could this result in this 61-year-old finally being exonerated?”

This weekend, BBC Expert Witness star Philip Boyce threw another spanner in the works of Essex Police and those trying to thwart a reinvestigation of the October 1986 conviction of Jeremy Bamber of the killings of his adoptive parents, his adoptive sister and her two sons at White House Farm in Tolleshunt D’Arcy, Essex in August 1985.

 

In a feature interview shown on YouTube just days after another programme, White House Farm murders – Is Jeremy Bamber Innocent?, also aired its first of three episodes also, Boyce revisited a key piece of evidence used by Essex Police that helped them in the case they built against a then 24-year-old, who is now aged 61 and who has spent 36 years of his life in prison.

 

In a 1:58-minute clip during an experiment in which he used an identical AGA to that that was in White House Farm in 1985, highly respected forensic scientist Boyce shared:

 

“Today, I was looking at the possibility that the burnmarks on Nevill Bamber’s back had been produced by part of the AGA whenever it was on full heat.”

 

“Thankfully, we actually got an AGA that is exactly the same model. As was in White House Farm back then.”

 

“Based on what I’ve actually done today using pig skin and effectively burning pig skin against the front of the AGA there is the definite possibility that the burn marks on Nevill’s back could have been made with the AGA.”

 

“… It’s very important in that it actually shows that there’s a possibility that Nevill Bamber’s body was actually physically moved after the police actually arrived at the scene and effectively the evidence was changed for want of a better word.”

 

Going further, in comments to The Mail on Sunday yesterday, Philip Boyce confirmed his report has been submitted to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) and added:

 

“This could indicate that Nevill Bamber’s body had been moved somehow to the position he was photographed in after he was burned by the Aga. The photographs of his body shown to the jury… may have been misleading.”

 

The paper’s Scott Jones and Glen Owens then concluded:

 

“The tests were filmed by documentary-maker Matt Harris, who said one photo also reveals another key detail. ‘The kitchen door is closed, with two chairs placed in front of it, he said. ‘This is the only door leading into the kitchen from outside, and this is where Essex Police entered… [they] were the only people who went into White House Farm that day and could have closed that door and placed those chairs in that way.’”

 

“Speaking last night from HMP Wakefield, Bamber said: ‘To restage the crime scene is a moral sin. These things should have been explored 37 years ago. It’s not a case of me proving or getting out on a technicality. I would like to prove my innocence through facts.’”

 

To learn more about the Jeremy Bamber Innocence Campaign – whose supporters number former MP Andrew Hunter, barrister Flo Krause, human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell and magistrate Lady Waterlow – and to join those supporting demands for a reinvestigation of this case, click here.

 

Editor’s Note – Unlike as is the case in many publications, this article was NOT sponsored or supported by a third-party. Follow Matthew Steeples on Twitter at @M_Steeples.

 

Interview with Philip Boyce, first aired on YouTube by the ‘Officialbambervideo’ account, November 2022:

Aired first yesterday, Sunday 27th November 2022, on YouTube, a short 1:58-minute interview with Philip Boyce, a forensic scientist specialising in firearms who has also recently featured in the BBC’s Expert Witness series, was filmed in West Sussex in July 2022.

 

‘White House Farm murders – Is Jeremy Bamber Innocent? (Episode 1)’ by ‘True Crime Newsquest,’ first aired on YouTube, November 2022:

The first part of a new three-part mini-series available on YouTube aired on the 22nd November and has been watched 2,200 times to date.  It lasts 13:25-minutes, is presented by Mark Williams-Thomas and features interviews with Newsquest reporter Tom Dalby and polygrapher Terry Mullins. The next eposide airs tomorrow, Tuesday 29th November 2022.

 

Interview by Shaun Attwood and Matthew Steeples with Yvonne Hartley and Philip Walker, first aired on YouTube, September 2021:

Watched over 44,000 times to date, this podcast has attracted over 950 comments also. It lasts 1:45-minutes and features two of the leading supporters of Jeremy Bamber casting “considerable doubt” on how his conviction came about.

 

Some questions Essex Police plainly need to answer regarding this case… Including some new ones that could lead to to the exoneration of jailed for 36 years and still protesting his innocence Jeremy Bamber

 

The scene of the murders during the night of 6th and 7th August 1985: White House Farm, Pages Lane, Tolleshunt D’Arcy, Maldon, Essex, CM9 8AA.
Jeremy Bamber’s adoptive parents, Ralph and June Bamber, and the grave where they are buried. Could he finally be exonerated of their killings in 2023?
Yesterday, Scott Jones and Glen Owen of ‘The Mail on Sunday’ reported on Philip Boyce’s discoveries. They ran with the headline: “Will THIS photo clear Jeremy Bamber of the notorious White House Farm murders 37 years on? Forensic scientist says the image suggests a body was MOVED by police before official snaps were taken.”
Mr Boyce – who has worked on high profile investigations as a forensic scientist for over 30 years –claimed that Essex Police could have “changed the evidence” in the case by moving the body of Nevill Bamber before official photographs of the scene were taken. If true, the three burn marks on Mr Bamber’s back would not have been inflicted by the hot end of a rifle but instead by his dead body being left lying against the AGA and its hot handles instead causing the burns. In photographs taken by police, shown to the trial jury at Chelmsford Crown Court in 1986, Nevill Bamber was instead seen slumped over an overturned chair in the kitchen.
On 24th November 2022, the new True Crime Newsquest mini-series ‘White House Farm murders – Is Jeremy Bamber Innocent?’ featured in an article by Jody Doherty-Cove. In it, Tom Dalby, a reporter on the Colchester Gazette and Essex County Standard, is quoted to say: “The support Bamber gets in prison – in 2017 he told us he [got] about 100 letters per week from supporters, 500 Christmas cards. There is this level of support he still gets from people locally… There are people who are very clear he is innocent.” In the programme also, former detective Mark Williams-Thomas quotes Essex Police Acting Chief Detective Michael Ainsley as having written in 1985: “On my return from annual leave, I obviously enquired as to the situation with the murders… [I was assured] the evidence indicated that Sheila [Caffell] was responsible.”
In April 2020, ‘The Steeple Times’ reported that “further questions about the conduct of Essex Police [were] raised as it [was] revealed they destroyed the bible, nightclothes and pillows that were found with the victims at White House Farm on the night of the 1985 murders. The 20th March 2000 letter from the Criminal Cases Review Commission to Glaisyers Solicitors LLP and Sheila Caffell is truly a shocking example of a bungling balls-up.
The clearly left open bible next to the body of Sheila Caffell was photographed by Essex Police, but was then not submitted as evidence and destroyed. A supposed suicide note also disappeared and countless other evidence was clearly tampered with. “What motivation did those processing the scene have to do this?” is a question that Essex Police and prosecutors have repeatedly failed to answer.
Veteran human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, a longtime supporter of Jeremy Bamber, tweeted about the case on 7th March 2021. He remarked: “Is this [the] greatest miscarriage of justice?” and previously in 2017, he wrote to the then chief constable of Essex Police, Stephen Kavanagh, to highlight the “grave injustice” of the force’s withholding and destroying evidence with regard to the White House Farm murders.
Jeremy Bamber’s legal team have alleged that the senior investigating officer in the case, Michael Ainsley, took documents relating to the case to his home in 2010 and destroyed them in spite of “knowing there was an active appeal underway.” Surely, now, it is time for a reinvestigation of this case at the very least if faith in the British justice system is to be retained.
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